Brandon Wathen
Ms. Jarmoszko Creative Photography I October 5th Essay II Niépce, Daguerre, and Talbot: Inventing Modern Photography The process of taking a picture has not always been as simple as pointing a camera and clicking a button, like the way it is today. In fact, the ease of capturing a moment through the lens of a camera is something modern people seem to take for granted, considering it’s only a quick click on an iPhone or a simple tap of a screen, and the fact we can capture images and video in definitions better than that of the human eye! But rather we acknowledge it or not, the creation of photography and the ability to capture a moment forever rather in digital format, or on a polaroid was a very difficult process and took many years to perfect and hone. Photography has been an ever changing art form for almost 200 years and will continue to be an ever changing asset to society for many years to come. The very first ever photograph was captured by Joseph Nicéphore Niépce in 1826 at his family estate in Chalon-sur-Saône, France, Le Gras 1. Originally meant to be an alternative to lithography, which Niépce claimed he wasn’t very good at because it required you to draw 2, the heliograph captured images on a polished pewter plate covered with an asphalt derivative of petroleum, Bitumen of Judea. The resulting image ends up becoming visible after you expose the plate for several hours and then rinse it with a mixture of white petroleum and lavender 2. While to us, the photo looks grainy and almost unrecognizable with only several architectural elements of La Gras being visible when printed this heliograph photo was the birth of modern photography, and the beginning of an art form where capturing images no longer took pen and pencil. While completely unrecognized during his lifetime, due to the development of newer and more efficient technologies created by Niécpe’s fellow scientist, Louis Jacques Mandé Daguerre, Niécpe’s work was the fundamental basis for photography, with the original photograph being the oldest remaining photograph still in existence. Though heliography is a practically useless application now due to the inventions of inventors like Daguerre, Niécpe inspired generators afterword to develop new forms of photography and photograph taking so as to revolutionize a stagnant art the same way he had. Louis Jacques Mandé Daguerre was a colleague to Niécpe and was also interested in capturing an image through the lens, and actually worked with Niécpe up until his death in 1833 before moving to Diorama, his studio/laboratory in Paris, France. While Daguerre and Niécpe were unable to find an efficient manner for taking photos that looked good and didn’t require long hours of exposure and a difficult printing process during Niécpe’s life, that didn’t perturb Daguerre from continuing his expedition into creating an efficient form of photography; and in 1838 that’s exactly what he had done. The daguerreotype was the brainchild of Daguerre (even considering the object bares his name) and completely sent Niécpe’s heliograph to the back of the line in groundbreaking discoveries. With the ability to create a unique and individual image each time printed on a silver plated sheet of copper that had been sensitized with iodine vapors and exposed in a box camera then developed in mercury fumes before being stabilized in salt water or “hypo” as Daguerre had called it, the daguerreotype was a whole new creation that revolutionized photography forever, and not only the the daguerreotype is attributed to having taken the first candid photo of a human being 3. This quick and simple photographic medium opened up a world of creation and exploration that couldn’t easily be opened with Niécpe’s design. Daguerre is also known for having developed a microscopic and a telescopic version of his daguerreotype which were destroyed in 1839 after Diorama burned to the ground, taking a large percentage of his creations, his laboratory, with it 3. Daguerre’s contributions to photography opened the door to the usage of the invention as a creative medium that many people could use and understand without going through a long complicated process like with that of the heliograph. Next in the line of innovative photographers is William Henry Fox Talbot who was a creative force to be reckoned with back in his time. Having explored topics such as Egyptology, philosophy, philology, astronomy, and botany, and published four books and upwards of twenty-seven scholarly articles, Talbot was basically a prodigy at just about everything, and with that, it was only natural that he would create something as interesting as the paper-printing camera. Having become tired and frustrated with working with a camera obscura, a device which projected images onto paper for the easy transfer of image to paper, Talbot decided that there had to be a way to print an image directly onto paper. After several attempts, he managed to create a device that could project an image onto paper by coating a sheet of writing paper in salt and a silver nitrate which is then darkened by the sun 4. Printing pictures on paper allowed for a cheaper and less costly manner of taking photo taking in comparison to Daguerre’s silver plated copper sheets that were needed with the daguerreotype camera. Niépce, Daguerre, and Talbot were the founding fathers of modern photography, and opened a door to a brand new creative medium that has later developed and become something we use in our daily lives. Were it not for them, our iPhones and professional cameras would be a thing of near myth, and the science of picture taking may never have developed. We have come a long way from images printed on silver and pewter, and some form of writing paper, and we should learn to appreciate the art form we have been gifted. Bibliography
0 Comments
Leave a Reply. |
Brandon DylanThese are my essays I've written for my Creative Photography class! Feel free to take a look and read a little. Archives
December 2016
Categories |